Troy Police colect evidence on the sceene of a shooting that occured at 3022 7th Avenue in Troy. (Mike Mcahon / The Record)

TROY - Police arrested a 17-year-old high school student for shooting her father once in the head with a rifle after the two argued over the use of credit card.

Trinity Copeland was arraigned Friday afternoon in front of Troy City Court Judge Chris Maier on second degree murder. Her father, Harlan Copeland was discovered with a gunshot would by family members at 4:30 a.m. at his home at 3022 Seventh Ave.

According to a statement she gave police, Copeland complied with her father's request to shoot him.

She said she took her father's ATM card on July 11 and used it at a corner store in Albany twice. The first time she spent $122 and the second she spent $32, according to her statement. Her father made a formal complaint to police and the father told her they would check video surveillance at the store to determine if she had used the credit card.

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At about 3:40 a.m., she said in the statement, she decided to fess up and went into the living room where her father was sitting on the couch drinking.

"He was highly upset," she said. "He said 'really,' I said 'yes.' He got up and went into his bedroom and got a gun."

He then came back into the living room and was telling her she was a "liar" and a "sneak."

"I was telling him I was sorry. I told him that I wanted to tell him before he saw it on video," she said in the statement. "He was like 'don't want to hear it.' He told me that he was gonna kill me. He was holding the gun and pointing it at me. My heart was pounding. He said after he killed me he was going to kill himself because he wasn't going to go to jail for me misbehaving."

She told police she begged him not to do it and he said "he was going to kill us both or I was going to have to kill him."

"I aimed it and he told me what to say to cover it up," she said to police. "Then I asked him again 'please don't make me kill you, it's not that serious.'

"He said either way he was going to die and he was giving me a way out," she said. "He laid back on the couch and I aimed at him. He said do it. I told him that I loved him and that I was sorry. Then I did it. I shot him. I put the gun on the ground and looked at him. I said 'dad, dad.'"

She told police there are no fingerprints because she wore gloves.

After the shooting, she said she grabbed her father's phone, went upstairs for help and then called the police.

The weapon was found at the scene, according to Capt. John Cooney, and police initially thought it could have been a suicide.